Direct Comparison: X-Fi Forte vs Essence STX through ATH-A900s

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gerbiaNem

2[H]4U
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I've had the Auzentech Forte for a few years now. It replaced a perfectly functional X-Fi Fatal1ty, but I need to see if I could improve my sound. Every since day one It has buzzed depending on GPU usage, and the sound would also corrupt every now and again. The sound quality was an improvement over the Fatal1ty, but the headache cost was too high. This is my second Forte after the first one decided to die after a couple months.

I decided I didn't want to deal with the crappy drivers anymore, so I just ordered the STX. I've installed both in my case side by side, and have a few thoughts on how they perform. I'm no audiophile, but I listen to a lot of music. The A900s were alternated between both headphone amps. The Forte plug is a lot more harsh on your headphone connector when try to remove your phones.

PC:
Core i7 950
12GB ram, all slots occupied
GTX 460
Gigabyte x58-UD3r
2x OCZ Agility 128GB Raid 0

The main differences:
- The STX caused the bios to load a few seconds slower, not a huge deal.
- No buzzing interference (I've tried the recommended tape trick, no go)! Complete silence when I have my headphones on. Thank God. The Forte was moved farther from the GPU also, but it still buzzed. No sound corruption yet either. I'm convinced that it was a driver issue since it happened more frequently when playing flash videos.
- STX has a much cleaner bass. The Forte sounds muddy in comparison. It's like the Forte is trying to fill the whole soundstage like a subwoofer. Unfortunately it recreates a cheap sub which booms at 100HZ no matter what note.
- The soundstage depth was similar, but different sounds didn't mix as much as on the Forte, a good setup.
- STX sounds similar to gaming with CMSS3D. Using the Dolby Headphone mode you can extend the soundstage a bit, but the fidelity suffers. Using Dolby Headphone on music makes it tinny and tries to recreate an echo on the more distance instruments, not my cup of tea. Using the 7.1 adjustment default causes the left channel to be louder than the right, I thought I was going crazy at first. Alchemy on the Forte might increase FPS, but nothing that I could notice.
- Being able to switch between speakers and phones through the control panel was a godsend. The front panel from Forte was an option, but the sound was terrible through the fronts.
- I have crappy logitech 2.1 speakers, but they still sound better with the STX in my opinion. This might be in my head since I don't use them all too often.
- The control panel no longer takes 8 seconds to load even on an SSD raid array! I miss the cool flying helicopter 3D effect though (no.. really).
- The midrange is more accurate, but this actually hurts if you're listening to low bitrate MP3s.

Bottom Line:
Does anyone want to buy a used Forte?
 
serbiaNem said:
I've had the Auzentech Forte for a few years now. It replaced a perfectly functional X-Fi Fatal1ty, but I need to see if I could improve my sound. Every since day one It has buzzed depending on GPU usage, and the sound would also corrupt every now and again. The sound quality was an improvement over the Fatal1ty, but the headache cost was too high. This is my second Forte after the first one decided to die after a couple months.

I decided I didn't want to deal with the crappy drivers anymore, so I just ordered the STX. I've installed both in my case side by side, and have a few thoughts on how they perform. I'm no audiophile, but I listen to a lot of music. The A900s were alternated between both headphone amps. The Forte plug is a lot more harsh on your headphone connector when try to remove your phones.

PC:
Core i7 950
12GB ram, all slots occupied
GTX 460
Gigabyte x58-UD3r
2x OCZ Agility 128GB Raid 0

The main differences:
- The STX caused the bios to load a few seconds slower, not a huge deal.
- No buzzing interference (I've tried the recommended tape trick, no go)! Complete silence when I have my headphones on. Thank God. The Forte was moved farther from the GPU also, but it still buzzed. No sound corruption yet either. I'm convinced that it was a driver issue since it happened more frequently when playing flash videos.
- STX has a much cleaner bass. The Forte sounds muddy in comparison. It's like the Forte is trying to fill the whole soundstage like a subwoofer. Unfortunately it recreates a cheap sub which booms at 100HZ no matter what note.
- The soundstage depth was similar, but different sounds didn't mix as much as on the Forte, a good setup.
- STX sounds similar to gaming with CMSS3D. Using the Dolby Headphone mode you can extend the soundstage a bit, but the fidelity suffers. Using Dolby Headphone on music makes it tinny and tries to recreate an echo on the more distance instruments, not my cup of tea. Using the 7.1 adjustment default causes the left channel to be louder than the right, I thought I was going crazy at first. Alchemy on the Forte might increase FPS, but nothing that I could notice.
- Being able to switch between speakers and phones through the control panel was a godsend. The front panel from Forte was an option, but the sound was terrible through the fronts.
- I have crappy logitech 2.1 speakers, but they still sound better with the STX in my opinion. This might be in my head since I don't use them all too often though.
- The control panel no longer takes 8 seconds to load even on an SSD raid array! I miss the cool flying helicopter 3D effect though (no.. really).
- The midrange is more accurate, but this actually hurts if you're listening to low bitrate MP3s.

Bottom Line:
Does anyone want to buy a used Forte?
Click to expand...


Thanks for this i am using the same card and making the same move.
No offense but dolby headphone is meant more for gaming isnt it?
I would think it would make music sound shitty...
 
Rattle said:
Thanks for this i am using the same card and making the same move.
No offense but dolby headphone is meant more for gaming isnt it?
I would think it would make music sound shitty...
Click to expand...

You would think, but the default music mode is set to Dolby Headphone large size room. I gave it a try on the different room settings, they all kill music.
 
My bad thanks for this.
I honestly do not have issues with my forte like most do, I just want an upgrade.
 
Rattle said:
My bad thanks for this.
I honestly do not have issues with my forte like most do, I just want an upgrade.
Click to expand...

Give it time. They are notorious for the headphone output going bad.

I kind of wish the Asus cards had the different modes like the Creative/Auzentech ones do, where you can easily switch between settings groups by changing modes (although I guess the Hi-Fi button serves a similar ,if less complete, purpose).
 
Forceman said:
Give it time. They are notorious for the headphone output going bad.

I kind of wish the Asus cards had the different modes like the Creative/Auzentech ones do, where you can easily switch between settings groups by changing modes (although I guess the Hi-Fi button serves a similar ,if less complete, purpose).
Click to expand...

This in fact just happened to me , forcing me to upgrade.

You'll end up with it as well as nearly all Forte owners do. Seriously the amount of defects on this card should make owners consider a class action lawsuit , such a failure card.
 
Godmachine said:
This in fact just happened to me , forcing me to upgrade.

You'll end up with it as well as nearly all Forte owners do. Seriously the amount of defects on this card should make owners consider a class action lawsuit , such a failure card.
Click to expand...

I've heard that if you press them, they will RMA it for you even if it is out of warranty since they had so many problems. I didn't bother though.
 
Thanks for this. I'm currently debating whether I should purchase an Essence STX or an HT Omega eClaro. I like the Essence STX and can only see myself using 2.0 output, but the STX screech/eeeeee bug I read about on Newegg/Headfi/Asus forums sounds scary so I'm leaning towards the eClaro. I wish the eClaro had a shield and didn't have the DSUB connector for analog outputs.
 
I really hate the breakout cable on my Forte. It's great if you need a low profile card, but I find myself putting strain on the connections or picking up noise from USB cables, etc., due to the breakout cable hanging down near the other cables.

The STX has much more robust 1/4 inch jacks, which I absolutely love, and has none of the above problems.

As for the lack of a shield, shields are effective, but there are other ways of keeping the signal path clean. The Forte's grounding issues, for instance, were not due to a lack of a shield, but rather that the card couples its ground to the case's ground and creates a ground loop.

As for driver issues, all cards have them, but to different extents. You need to remember that the STX is a very, very popular card compared to the eClaro. So a minority with issues is going to appear far more vocal and appear to be larger where in fact it is not.

From my own experience, many of the issues stem from Windows 7 x64, but I was at least able to resolve them with the STX. With my Forte, I was not.
 
For the control panel loading slowly you may want to give the unified Xonar drivers a shot. I've been using the c-media control panel version and its been working well for me. The only downside is that there is no GX which never really worked for me anyways.
 
If all goes well I should be getting a like new stx for 135 shipped next week.
 
If ya want a bigger soundstage and different audio qualities out of the STX just change the opamps. Default ones sound tinny and small in comparison to some of the options out there for opamp combinations.
 
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